


Dialling Down

by Nadja_Lee



Category: The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Sacrifice, Sappy, Secrets, Self-Harm, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-29
Updated: 2006-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:40:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22993342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nadja_Lee/pseuds/Nadja_Lee
Summary: Jim dials down an injury to be able to protect Blair and soon it becomes a dangerous habit he cannot control.
Relationships: Jim Ellison/Blair Sandburg
Kudos: 29





	Dialling Down

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: This story deals with a darker side to Sentinel powers.

#  Dialling Down

It was something Blair had taught him to do. When his sensory impressions seemed to overwhelm him he could dial them down to a normal level. Or beyond. 

He hadn’t considered the possibilities before Blair had been in danger. He had acted on pure instinct, a Sentinel protecting his Guide. Wounded, he had still been able to fight and win. Blair had been rescued without a mark on him. It wasn’t until the younger man had assured him that he was fine and he had worried commented on Jim’s wound, a gun shot to the shoulder, that Jim realized he couldn’t feel the pain at all. Not wanting to worry Blair he hadn’t mentioned it nor had he thought too much about it himself. He had brushed it off as adrenaline and his Covert Ops training. It was first later, when he had gone over the incident in his head that he realized that though he should have been able to fight in his condition he should still have felt the pain and it should still have slowed him down. 

Some months passed and he didn’t think more about it. Blair had been rescued and that was all that mattered. Then another incident arose and again Jim found he was able to push himself further and far beyond normal human endurance. Within long using his abilities to dial down his sensory impressions about pain, exhaustion and at times even the need for food or water became a tool he used often when lives where at stake - in particular if that life was Blair’s.

After a year where he still had not told Blair about his newfound skills; knowing they would worry him, Jim began to realize his use of these new abilities was taking their toll on him. As a trained medic he had always known there would be a price to pay for what he did but he hadn’t wanted to think about it. His body was able to repress pain and bodily needs to such a degree he could not feel them, but that did not mean they were not there. His body’s signals were warnings for him to slow down and he was repressing them to be able to move ahead and do what his Sentinel instincts told him to do; protect. Luckily he was alone when a signal came he could not repress…he simply collapsed. When he woke up he realized he hadn’t been drinking much that day and put it down to that as well as a lack of sleep. He started to use his new abilities more carefully but when he collapsed a second time he decided to go see a doctor. With the aid of his strategic training he managed to do so without alerting Blair to what was going on. The news was not good. He was slowly burning himself out. Blair would likely have called it that he was draining his own lifeforce or something like that, but Jim knew it was simply a matter of limits. He was pushing his body far beyond what he could endure and did so on a regular basis. Determined to stop using his newfound abilities he had left the doctor’s office, sure he had solved the matter.

Yet back at work he soon found that wasn’t so easy. The Sentinel in him wanted him to use any means necessary to save lives and those urges were as hard to control as the Sentinel urges and desires he had for his Guide. Though he could, with great strain, repress the instinct to use his newfound abilities when strangers were in danger, unless it was in extreme circumstances, he was unable, and unwilling, to do so when it came to Blair. His life was more important than anything – even his own. 

Blair had once told him that the Sentinels of old had a short life span. He believed it to be because they were the best warriors and was sent to the front to do the most dangerous fighting as warrior leaders of their people. Jim now knew differently. A Sentinel’s survival instincts were overruled by his instincts to protect – and none more than his Guide. 

For some weeks Jim fought with this new knowledge; that he was slowly killing himself through his own instincts of protectiveness of in particular Blair. He could avoid it…he could send his Guide away. Yet that was never a real option. Over the years he had came to love the young scholar and though the other man had never indicated he felt likewise, Jim could not let go or move on. He would keep Blair by his side, love him in silence, protect him always…as a Sentinel and as a man. There was no other option…nor did he want to create one, for life without Blair had become an unthinkable thought to him.

Perhaps the reason for the short life span Sentinels in general had was that it had been as unthinkable for them as it was for him. The bizarre thing was…Jim was ok with that as long as he knew Blair was well. He could imagine no greater love than this nor a better death than knowing he died so his Guide, the man he had come to love, would live. 

The end


End file.
